“O-kay.” Daisy took a sip of coffee to give her a chance to digest some of what Lou had just thrown at her. “So, Chris wants me to tell you what I saw this morning so you can add it to your killer board?”
“Murder board.” Lou was actually bouncing on her sofa cushion. Daisy understood why she’d declined caffeine. Even without it, Lou looked about ready to rocket into space. “What did you see this morning? Did Chris actually think it was related to Willard’s case? You need to start spilling immediately. I’m dying here!”
“I’m spilling! I’m spilling!” Daisy hurried to explain before Lou started levitating. “I think I saw someone moving a body.”
Lou went perfectly still before shrieking, “What?”
Wincing, Daisy shot the other woman a look.
“Sorry,” Lou mumbled through the fingers she’d clapped over her mouth. After a few deep breaths, she let her hand drop back to her lap. “I get excited when someone mentions dead bodies. Oh, wow, that just went to a really wrong place, didn’t it? Okay, so forget my disturbing remark and get back to your story. I promise there will be no more screaming, unless you reveal something totally shocking. Let’s just say that I will attempt to keep my verbal exclamation points to a minimum, how about that?”
“Um…sure. This morning, around three thirty, I saw someone loading what looked like a tarp-wrapped body into a sheriff’s department vehicle.”
Instead of screaming, Lou just stared, her mouth open. Daisy sipped her coffee and let the other woman process the information. After several moments passed, Lou finally moved. She set her water bottle on the coffee table with the utmost care. Pulling her cell phone out of her back jeans pocket, she jabbed at the screen and then put the cell to her ear.
“Cal,” Lou said into her phone, “you need to bring the whiteboard over to Daisy Little’s house. I’m getting vital information here. I need my markers.” Her forehead creased at his response. “The whiteboard is an important part of our investigation team, Cal. We need him here.” She continued in an overly patient tone, as if the answer should’ve been obvious. “Of course the whiteboard is male. I named him Emerson.” Lou paused again. “Because someone named Emerson has to be intelligent. So, are you up for a whiteboard delivery?”
By Lou’s crestfallen expression, Daisy was pretty sure the answer was “no.” “Fine. I still love you, even if you are leaving me lost and whiteboardless.” She glanced at Daisy and gave her an apologetic look, mouthing no whiteboard. “Daisy Little’s house. Uh-huh. That Daisy Little.” Absently, she reached out with her free hand and started turning her water bottle in circles. “Deputy Chris drove me here. He was being really insistent in a weird and vague way about how I needed to talk to Daisy. Apparently, she saw a deputy moving a dead body really early this morning.” Lou listened for a minute. “That’s okay. Chris can give me a ride ho—fine! I’ll call you. You know,” her tone turned crafty, “if I bought that old International pickup I want, you wouldn’t have to be my taxi service.” Her disappointed, no-whiteboard frown returned. “But it’s adorable. Who needs modern safety features when I’m driving something so awesome? Yes. Okay. We’ll argue about this later. I need to get all the body-moving details from Daisy now.” Lou looked a little too excited about the prospect. “Uh-huh. Love you, too. Bye.”
After poking at her phone again, Lou tucked it into her back pocket. “No whiteboard.”
Daisy snorted. “I got that.”
“Do you have a notebook or a piece of paper or something?” Lou asked. “I know I’m not going to remember everything.”
“Sure.” Daisy retrieved a small notebook and a pen from the junk drawer in the kitchen and offered them to Lou before taking her seat on the couch again.
“Perfect. Thank you.” Lou flipped open the notebook cover. “Now tell me everything.”
Chapter 4
They went over all the details multiple times. Instead of making Daisy more certain about what she’d seen, it only increased her doubts. Repeating the story over and over made what happened sound so outlandish and unbelievable.
“What if there’s some stupidly simple and innocent explanation for this?” she finally asked Lou. “I’m going to feel so dumb that I’ve wasted your time and Chris’s and—”
“Stop.” Lou cut off her torrent of words. “If that’s true, then Chris will see it in the call log, and we’ll all be happy that no one is dead. But can you really think of a good reason for someone dressed in black to be shoving something shaped like a dead body—including a boot!—into a sheriff’s squad at three in the morning?”
Daisy had been trying all day to come up with a logical explanation, and she hadn’t succeeded. She shook her head.
“Me neither. It’s not like we’re going to do crazy things with this information. We’re just going to add it to the other facts on the whiteboard and see if it snaps together with any of the other puzzle pieces.”